The Great Dirt Pile of 2012

March 27, 2012

Big shout-outs to Long Island Compost this week as they delivered a humongous pile of healthy, beautiful dirt to the Stockton Street expansion on Saturday morning! And what? All for the price of….delivery! This is amazing, considering soil acquisition is normally one of the most expensive undertakings when farming in the city. It seems counter-intuitive since you’re probably all looking at your entryways wondering “if it’s so hard to come by, what did I just track in?”

Chemicals. Well, actually, who knows…you’ll have to take the sample to a lab. But in empty lots around the city, what looks like soil is usually generations of chemical pollution layered upon other generations of chemical pollution. Which is why it’s so important, now that we’re in the process of planting our fruit trees (!!!), that we have access to good, clean, compost-generated building material! Did we say thank you, Long Island Compost?

Just look at all 7 feet of it:

Get crack-a-lackin’!

And here it is enjoying its new home…(within the gates)…

…with the social graces of its Welcoming Committee, a handful of trusty BCF volunteers (this, too, could be YOU).

Speaking of…did we mention those fruit trees? We’ve been chiseling away at the ongoing Fruit Tree Box Project all winter long in our woodshop and things are coming together!!

We now have several boxes set up in the confines of the Stockton lot, and most exciting of all, we have a couple of pioneering fruit trees putting down roots! Check out this baby!

You can’t see it from here but this is a Fruit Cocktail tree. Short of growing aluminum cans when it starts to produce, it will actually be providing peaches, nectarines, plums and apricots; a one-stop shop for (not) all of your needs and ever so much better than those pre-fabricated urban-sprawl buildings!

And thus, assuming we’re on the path to warmer weather, we will be having another work weekend this weekend, March 31/April 1, so come by the Broadway and/or Stockton lots after about 12:30 pm if you want to set our soil up on a date with our fruit trees…or spread wood chips…or chisel…or…..

Speaking of Broadway, the chickens say hi.

All photos, except the last, are courtesy of BCF Volunteer Jason Reis.